Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Angelfish on the beach

He was not a happy camper, flapping around sideways in the surf.

It was one of those very traditional days (is this what Mexico does to people?) where the men played horseshoes and the women went for a stroll. I'd brought my snorkel and mask, but no one else wanted to join me, so that activity was out. Face it, snorkeling in the sea is not a thing to do without a buddy.

While we females strolled our way down the sand, we spotted a frantic-looking flapping in the waves. An angelfish, clearly in distress. Rennie waded out and picked him (her?) up, trying to reorient him and get him back out past the breaking waves. Not much bigger than her open hand, he was a beauty -- silver with black zebra stripes. It was hard finding a picture similar to his kind, but if you click here, then follow down to the bottom right, you'll see one of his cousins.

For a while it seemed as though he might have made it, as he was swimming quite upright, little dorsal fin straight up as an antenna, so we walked on. But then, on our way back, there he was again, struggling. We tried a few more rescues, but finally gave up as a lesson from nature.

Still, I wondered: had we been a group of men, how might our behaviour have been different? Or would they have done exactly the same things we tried?

2 comments:

Janet Vickers said...

Didd you pick him up and throw him back in the water? Do they sting?

hg said...

Oh, Janet. You could sooo have been part of our group. That's exactly what we did. But I will tell more once I'm home, am back on high-speed (in more ways than one), and can post some pics to accompany these ramblings from Mexico.
And no, they don't sting. Or at least this one didn't.